Author's Note: This fic is dedicated to LoVeCrjo28, who requested the full story behind Veronica's reference to a bank robber in my post-movie Navy!Logan fic, "Light Me Up." This is standalone but same world as my fic "Light Me Up" and "The Most Unexpected Valentine."
The Ninja Turtle masks are a homage to Cheshirecatstrut's truly excellent Point Break/bank heist fic, Taking the Drop, on Ao3. You should all read that one and leave kudos aplenty.
Skype is Sacred
Veronica sat in an alley, her fingers tapping the steering wheel with a sound like a rain of rice hitting the pavement at a bride's feet. The BMW's engine idled with a growl that sounded faintly avaricious. It had been more restrained when Logan was still in town, she thought. The longer he was gone, the more ferocious it sounded.
Possibly she was projecting.
Or maybe there was some kind of special, engine-related maintenance you were supposed to do for very expensive cars that went above normal Jiffy Lube standards. Have the carburetors polished by nuns with Ph.D.'s or lug nuts lubricated by the tears of Russian snow cheetahs.
Veronica dialed up her scowl at the dashboard clock, setting it to a glare. "Come on, come on, come on…"
Eventually, the ventilation grate popped out of the bank's back wall and dropped to the concrete, scaring a stray cat away with a petulant yowl. A man's body worked itself out next, the sharp elbow leading to a confusion of hipbones clad in track pants. As he landed on his feet, the shapes all unfolded to make a skinny package topped with a Ninja Turtles mask and carrying a duffel bag full of cash.
Veronica threw open the passenger door. "Go! Go! Go!"
He hesitated. "Who the fuck—"
"Barry got a flat tire." She threw a glance over her shoulder. "You want to get in, or you want to hoof it with your bag of loot? Pretty sure even the bike cops could catch up with you if you try to mall walk your way to freedom."
He hurled the bag into the passenger side and jumped in after it.
"Bag in the trunk!" she snapped. "Were you born in a barn?"
"What?"
"Trunk's lead-lined," she explained, letting the engine rev to give voice to her impatience. "If they got any of the money packs with trackers into that bag of yours, it'll confine the signal."
Logan's trunk was not, in point of fact, lead-lined. But if any of the money had exploding dye-packs, she didn't want to know how many blow jobs it would take to make her new boyfriend forget about the damage to his upholstery.
Then again…she tilted her head. Maybe she did.
But it was too late for her to finish the math on that particular equation, because the bank robber was already out of the car. He threw the duffel in the trunk, then sprinted back and leapt into the passenger seat, barely getting the door slammed before she took off.
Veronica skidded around the corner onto the road with a squeal of tires.
"Mask?" she prompted.
The robber reached to peel it off, then paused. "Wait, who are you? Barry sent you?"
Veronica flew around a Toyota Camry, passing against oncoming traffic in a school zone. "I'm Barry's replacement, and I will be going to go to jail right along with you if anybody catches sight of that Donatello mask, friend. It's the most recognizable part of your crew's M.O. Even Fox News has it, that's how old the scoop is."
He tore off the mask, revealing cadaverous cheekbones and shredded chapped lips that released the scent of Carmex and sweaty rubber into the BMW. Veronica spun the wheel with one palm while cranking up the ventilation fans with the other. Eight minutes left. She wasn't going to make it, not even if she booted this dweeb out the window in front of the sheriff's department and texted the explanation in later.
Plus, the email still hadn't come in.
"What's that?" he asked, pointing through the windshield.
Orange-striped saw horses crouched up ahead, their glitter of reflective tape dazzling in the bright Pacific sunshine. Behind them were some mom-looking black sedans, the red and blue light bars across the top a poor attempt to lend their frumpy lines some authority.
"That, my dear Donatello, is a police blockade. Guess bank security is a little quicker on the speed dial than you gave them credit for." It was also very likely the death knell of any good girlfriend points she'd managed to build up with the airmail care package of sugar cookies spiked with Logan's favorite protein powder and organic fiber supplements. "Fuck my shitty luck," she growled. "Always with the traffic in this town."
She downshifted and joined the line of cars waiting to be hassled by the appropriate wielders of donut-clutching authority. Six minutes. Change of plan, then.
Her eyes flicked over to check the street sign to peg their exact location, then to her passenger. "Gloves," she snapped, nodding to the blue nitrile gloves he was still wearing to avoid leaving prints on the bank vault. "Also, the gun has to go."
He rolled off the gloves and crammed them in his pocket—good boy, that'd leave the evidence handily accessible when they got to the station later—then yanked open the catch to her glove box. Two protein bars and a lipstick rolled out and Veronica scowled.
"Not in the glove box, dummy! I'll have to open that when they ask for license and registration."
"Right, right, sorry."
She flipped open the center console, and gritted her teeth when the velvet scent of Logan's aftershave drifted out. He kept a small bottle of the stuff in there, and the cut-glass container was so severely, beautifully geometric that it looked like it should have a white-gloved guard and a velvet rope. But then, the way it smelled would have women tossing their panties at the base of its spot-lit pedestal.
The bank robber dumped his gun into the console, metal hitting expensive glass with an affronted-sounding chunk.
"Safety first!" Veronica chirped, pasting on a PTA smile as she glided up to the second spot in line. They were close enough that the bald spot of the officer at the checkpoint was catching the sun now.
Donatello the Dipshit belatedly flipped the safety catch on his pistol and she slapped the console closed as she accelerated into first place.
"Hello, officer," she cooed. "What seems to be the problem here?"
"Just another bank heist. No worries, though, Veronica. We got the whole area cordoned off. Guy won't get too far." He smiled. "Sorry about your fee. I heard the insurance company—"
"Bygones!" She cut him off before he could give away too much about her current client. "Far be it from a Mars to protest the legitimate carriage of justice."
Stan gestured to her passenger. "Who's this fella? Little shorter than I remember your better half being, heh heh."
Veronica simpered, though she didn't particularly care for Stan's semi-awed, homoerotic admiration of Logan's physique. Especially when he wasn't in town to bear the brunt of the awkwardness himself. "Nope, haven't traded in the old ball and chain yet. This is Ben, source for that case I'm working about the lawnmowers and the fast food chain."
"Oh!" Stan's eyebrows shot up. "That one's a doozy. Do you really think the cat was animatronic?"
"Well, it might have been a real cat, but the real question is whether it was planted by the client or the criminal." To cut off this line of shop talk, Veronica made a courtesy lean toward the open glove box, still spilling half-unwrapped tampons and fast food wrappers into the lap of the fidgeting bank robber. "You want to see the registration? It's Logan's car, obviously."
"No, that's fine. How's he doing?"
"Being all he can be." She snatched something out of the glove box and closed it, then covered her mouth with faux chagrin. "Oopsie, that's the army tagline, isn't it? He'd disown me if he ever heard."
"Your secret's safe with me." The officer's eyes twinkled down at her from the creases of his pudgy cheeks. Beside her, the bank robber had started to sweat.
She reached out of the open window and passed something swiftly into the officer's palm with a wink. "As is yours, Stan. You have a good day, now."
"You too, Veronica." He patted the roof of her car. "Give your dad my best."
She dropped it into gear while Officer Stan popped the handful of Rolaids she'd given him. She took off fast and quiet, and just barely below the speed that would make the tires slip and bark.
Two minutes.
"Who the hell are you?" Donatello the Dipshit exhaled, staring at her with bug eyes. "And how did you…but why…" he sputtered.
She cut off a yellow Lamborghini to take a right turn from the left lane, and jerked the car to a stop in the alley outside her house.
"Get out," she snapped, grabbing her purse and rescuing the lipstick from the floormat—it was a Lisa Eldridge, for Christ's sake. "They've got police blockades all over this area. We need to hole up until the heat's off."
"The trunk—"
"Lead lined, remember? Keep up." She was already halfway up the stairs to her apartment. "The bag'll be safer in the trunk than with us."
He broke into a jog, following her up the stairs. "Where is this?"
"Safe house." She jammed her keys into the lock and swept a door hanger from a pizza delivery service off the doorknob. One minute.
"Do you have any Carmex? Or lip balm?" he asked, dogging her so close she could smell his latex-sweaty hands and cheap deodorant. "I get so chapped when I'm nervous."
"I do, yeah. And I've got the perfect bolt hole you can hide in back here. If the cops start a building-to-building sweep, we need them to not find you here."
Also, she needed her boyfriend to not hear the guy she'd brought home. Or see him, because that would lead to relentless teasing. Donatello the Dipshit followed her into the bathroom and all the way into the shower, looking around for a secret door. When he didn't find one, he frowned.
"I don't think the shower curtain is really going to be that good of a disguise," he ventured.
"Neither do I," she said. "But that bar's the only solid option in the apartment." She slapped a handcuff on his wrist and locked the other side to the handicap bar in her shower. "I tried using the pipes under the sink once, and my landlord still hasn't forgiven me."
"What the fuck?"
She ignored this question as she gave him the world's fastest and most distasteful frisk for other weapons. "Stay quiet. Cops," she reminded as she backed out of the bathroom. "If you need to pee, the toilet's right there. Don't even think about forgetting to put the seat back down." She shut the door and dashed to the living room, skidding into her chair just as the Skype chimed.
She smoothed her hair and hit the button to accept. "Hey, sugar britches. How's it hanging?"
"My dick or the victim of last night's court martial?"
"Isn't walking the plank a little more nautical themed? I would think you'd leave punishments like boring old hanging to the Army grunts."
Logan clucked his tongue. "That's just littering. Don't you care about the health of the world's oceans? You wouldn't believe the floating cities of water bottles we find out here."
"Of course I care. Why do you think I drink only whiskey? Not a water bottle in sight, babe. And I gotta think the sharks and crabs would take care of the corpses. Traitors are biodegradable as fuck, as we all learned from my domestic terrorist/scuba diving instructor case last month."
"True. I'll pass your feedback along to the leading brass." He gave her a slow, sweet smirk. "How are you? You look good. Flushed."
"I've been working out."
"Pull the other one. The left is long enough."
"Okay, you caught me. I was having a little afternoon delight with Mr. D batteries." She waved her fingers. "Hence the flush. I figured if I took the edge off, I could keep things clean for a whole Skype conversation."
"And yet you only made it a minute fifteen before mentioning your vibrator." Logan made a quick, casual movement below the cover of the desk.
"And you only made it a minute seventeen before touching your penis."
"So, we're improving."
"Vastly."
He grinned at her, and she tried not to grin back. Failed.
Tried not to let the grin go a little dopey and infatuated. Failed.
Giving up, she propped her chin in her hand and just drank in the sight of him in that tight-in-the-shoulders uniform, with his last name embroidered sexily across his right pocket.
"Hi."
"Hi yourself, gorgeous."
From down the hall came the sound of someone peeing. There was quite a bit of splashing that spelled bad things for her afternoon. Veronica's eye twitched and she only barely caught herself before she glared that way.
"What was that?" Logan asked.
"Nothing. The neighbor's playing Chumbawumba again."
"You know we didn't spend all that time getting you your concealed carry license just so you could get it revoked for shooting the neighbor."
"What if it was only a flesh wound?"
"Is it ever just a flesh wound with you?"
He sat back in his seat, his strong thighs relaxing as his eyes warmed for her. It was so wrong how Logan could make even manspreading look sexy.
"It is if I miss." She batted her eyelashes. From down the hall, it had gone suspiciously silent. She glanced that way.
Logan frowned. "Is there something going on there?"
"Not a thing, honey-dong." She tilted the screen a little away from the hallway just in case the bank robber got loose. "What are you wearing?"
"This is Skype. You can see what I'm wearing."
Namely, the tiny hint of a white undershirt peeking from beneath his collar and all those colorful bars and insignia that meant he was a recognized, Naval-grade badass. Veronica got a little wet, and crossed her legs so she could pretend like she hadn't. The shower curtain rattled from down the hall. Shit.
"Well, in that case," she said quickly. "Let's talk about what I'm wearing. Or, if you fast-forward a minute or two, to what I'm not wearing." She began to unbutton her shirt.
Logan went pale. "Veronica, what's going on over there that you're trying to distract me from?"
"Other than my extreme amount of sexual frustration?"
He reached for the screen like he could physically stop her from undressing. "Veronica, if there's something dangerous going on over there, you should have your clothes on to deal with it. Do I need to hang up and call your dad for backup?"
She slouched in her chair, shirt half-unbuttoned, and pouted. "As if Dad would know how to use Skype. Besides, he's still limping around with a cane."
"You know very well that I meant I'd Skype Mac, who would text your dad. And slow on the cane doesn't mean he's not still quick on the draw, as he so memorably reminded me when he caught us making out in his hospital room when we thought he was sleeping."
"To be fair, you probably shouldn't have had your hand up my bra."
"He was on morphine! And if we're really being fair, you probably shouldn't have had your hand down my pants."
"That was me being fair!"
"Veronica…" Logan's long finger hovered over the disconnect button.
Her pout went mutinous. "You catch more flies with honey…"
He sighed. "So, you want me to take my shirt off?"
"How is that even a question?"
He appeared slightly mollified by this reassurance that the situation wasn't immediately dangerous. He started unbuttoning his uniform top.
"Remember that one time when I had you bent over on the bedroom floor, my hand on the back of your neck and your panties tangled around your knees?"
She leaned forward. "Oh, do I…"
"We can talk about the rest after you tell me what's going on."
She glared. He stopped unbuttoning.
"It's fine! I just have a bank robber cuffed in the bathroom."
"Oh! Why didn't you just say so? Jesus, Veronica, I thought it was the mob again. Or that guy Julius."
She blew a dismissive noise. "Eh, Julius. I have so much dirt on him at this point he'd have to buy his own backhoe to dig out if he wanted to try me." She flicked her finger toward the buttons on his uniform. "Now, you know what they say about finishing what you started."
He obediently went back to unbuttoning. "Hey, why did you bring the bank robber home to—awww!" He grinned.
"Why are you 'awww-ing'?" she snarled.
"You didn't want to miss our call."
"And miss your scintillating wit? Jawline that could cut glass? Besides, I wanna hear how hazing the nugget is going."
"Or you wanted me to talk dirty to you because you never come as hard on your own."
Veronica started to sweat.
"Nah, it's all about the hazing gossip," she said breezily. "Did he fall for the 'take this to the junior chief' prank?"
His eyes were sweet, the hint of a smile lifting his mouth. "You know, if you were in the middle of busting a bank heist, you could have rescheduled our call."
"And miss a good internet day? What am I, a monster?" She paused to appreciate the flex and play in his arms as he shrugged out of his uniform shirt. "The static freezes the screen at JUSTTHEWRONG moment so often that I'm starting to think you pay the comms guys just to mess with me."
"Veronica. Why would I do that?"
"You're a natural born tease, that's why!"
"How do you figure?"
"Remember that one time, when you had me bent over on the bedroom floor, with your hand on the back of my neck and my panties around my knees…"
His grin was swift this time. "That was different."
She heard a voice from the bathroom and looked up, her brow furrowing. Who was he talking to?
"What are you frowning about? You checked the bank robber for weapons, right?"
"What, is this my first day? Of course I checked him for weapons."
"Take his phone?"
She shoved away from the table and darted down the hall, accompanied by the sound of Logan's laughter. Donatello was babbling into his phone before she snatched it away, hung it up, and powered it down. "Bad dog." She pointed the phone at him. "And you're cleaning my bathroom before we go to the station, mister."
"Why did you get me through the police checkpoint if you were just going to turn me in?" he whined.
"Women are mysterious and capricious creatures. You can ponder that while you're scrubbing your piss off my tiles."
She closed the door and headed back to the table.
"I don't want to hear a single 'I told you so' out of you, buddy, or you're on the no-button plan until you make it home." She rebuttoned her shirt just to lend teeth to the threat.
"Mum is the watchword." Logan smirked.
She should have outlawed smirks, too.
Her phone chimed the email alert from her messenger bag by the door.
"What was that?" Logan's smirk disappeared. "Did he get a call out? You better not have left your gun at the office again."
Shit, she knew she'd left something at the office.
"Of course I didn't," she scoffed. "And that was just my phone. At ease, Lieutenant. As it happens, I was waiting for a very important email and it just came in. So everything's coming up Veronica. Or it will be, once you get that shirt off, and tell me if that prank made the newbie cry."
"You want shirt or prank gossip first?"
She bit her lip. "Damn. What a question. And you say you're not a tease?"
The doorbell rang.
Logan glowered. "I really wish you hadn't just lied to me about your gun."
Veronica really wished she hadn't also left the bank robber's gun in her car.
She smiled brightly. "That's just the pizza I ordered. You know what I always say!"
"Eat before you turn in a criminal, because the paperwork takes forever," Logan parroted obediently. The familiar saying seemed to relax him and he nodded toward the door. "Go ahead. You'll enjoy the punchline to the hazing story better on a full stomach. Let's just say we found a use for that half-rotted octopus that got caught in the anchor chain last Tuesday."
She blew him a kiss and went to answer the door, bending to hitch her messenger bag over her shoulder before she twisted the knob.
"Barry!" she crowed, cramming the taser into his belly. "I knew a good getaway driver like you wouldn't take too long with that flat tire."
His only answer was the thump of two hundred pounds of criminal falling to the ground, rattling her wooden stairs.
"I know, I know," she said, perching on his chest as she pulled the zip ties out of the side pocket of her bag. "I could have saved you a few bucks by letting the air out of your tire at that gas station rather than slashing it, but where's the fun in that?"
He groaned just as she got his arms around the post of her stairs and the second zip tie linked around his other wrist.
She went to zip the pocket of her bag closed, hesitated, and instead took the lipstick out and reapplied—it was Lisa Eldridge, after all. Why let it go to waste?—then blotted on the edge of his tee shirt before she patted his chest.
"Just rest a minute, Barry. The Neptune police and I will be with you shortly."
"Veronica Mars!" A voice rang out from the apartment door at the bottom of the steps. "What is that young man doing lying on the stairs?"
"Sorry, Mrs. Smolenska!" Veronica gave her a cheery wave. "Drunk. You know how spring breakers get. Don't worry, I tied him up so he can't fall down and the cops will be by sooner or later. He was babbling some pretty crazy stuff, though, so pay him no mind. You were right—boys really can't hold their tequila these days."
Mrs. Smolenska nodded sagely. "They don't make 'em like they used to. Gorgeous lipstick, by the way. What a lovely shade of red."
"Lisa Eldridge," Veronica called back. "You can find her makeup tutorials on YouTube."
She shut the door, made a quick call, and went back to the table, practically growling with frustration at all the delays.
Logan was grinning.
"What are you so happy about?" she grouched.
"Damn, I missed you. You make active combat duty look boring, you know that?"
He was leaning back in his chair, looking handsome and wholesome in his bright white undershirt, except for the wicked shadow to his grin that said he remembered every little trick he had invented to make her writhe, whimper, and beg. His chest looked even more cut than it had when she left, and she could remember all too well how the thick pad of muscle was the perfect amount of firm and soft to lay her head on when she was really tired.
"Have I mentioned that I hate my life lately?" she said.
"Almost daily since we hit the nine-week mark."
"Well, let's see if you can restore my optimism. How do you feel about a little tit for tat?" She skimmed off her shirt and tossed it down onto the floor.
Now Logan was the one glowering. "Wait, where are the bank robbers? I know they're headed to the Big House, but I'm not really sure they've earned this good of a send-off."
"One's cuffed in the bathroom and the other one is tied up on the porch. I can't exactly pull off the 2 for 1 drop by myself, though, so I had to call for a pick up. We don't have much time, because Neptune PD's response times are down to twelve minutes." She unzipped her jeans. "So, you had better talk really dirty, flyboy."
"Fuck, I love you."
"Damn right you do." She leaned closer to the camera and slipped her hand down her panties. "Now, we're down to eleven minutes. Make it filthy."
"Copy that, Mars."
THE END